Lissa and I were there for the first taping.
There was some off-color humor from the panelists, but honestly it wasn't *more* such than you'd find on an old episode where Hal Block flirted with a female contestant or Arlene asked to feel the biceps of a strappin' young lad; it was just *different.*
Game play was not great, but then, it wasn't on the first episodes of the original series either. The panelists wore nice-ish street clothes, which seemed fine to me: gowns and tuxedos would look out of place on a comedy show--and that's what the executive producer said up front they were aiming for.
I'm not quite sure what took them so long to tape (and what the delays were between segments), or why the studio had to be meat-locker cold during the whole thing (honestly, the coldest studio I've ever been in!). There were no prizes on offer for winners, which is fine, but then why bother to make a big deal out of "10 'no's and you win the game"? (I assume, if they were to get to series, that your "prize" would be the trip to NYC or LA for the taping. Or maybe not.
The way panelists were swapped in and out from one segment to the next indicated to me that we were seeing what was not meant to be a contiguous half-hour show, even with editing. (It would be awfully weird to come back from commercial to find Dorothy and Arlene had switched seats during the break.) Perhaps these segments were intended as pilots for Buzzr's YouTube channel.
The panelists weren't terrific, but neither were the guests. There was a fair amount of obfuscation, particularly by a guest whose line was "graffiti artist," but who answered yes to questions about his product being applied to the human body. (Apparently he also does body painting, but that seems to have nothing to do with graffiti.) And don't get me started on the burning question: are 20-something men physically incapable of sitting upright in a chair or tucking in their shirt tails?
I really liked the "mystery history" segment--which was the real reason to have the sidekick around: he plays the historical character. In an improv-comedy way, his character is not given to him until the segment begins. In that case, the host needs to be well-prepared to help answer questions, lest the segment go rambling.
All in all, since I'm not sure what the market is (daytime? late night? CBS? Comedy Central? Web?) it's impossible to tell whether they came close to getting it. But I wish them well and would love to see a respectful (if comedic) revival of the franchise sometime soon.
